C'mon. I want to know what Wilson could have done with a 300lb guy charging at him and an accomplice who may or may not decide to turn around and join the fray. You might, somehow, say he's probably (that means his odds are better than 50%!) going to prevail because he's a cop with a little stick and a can of pepper spray, but if you're going to be honest, you're going to say that his best chance of ending the situation peacefully is to point the gun at Brown and tell him to stop.

You want to know what Wilson could have done? He could not have been an arrogant asshole cop and pulled up and starting yelling at these guys. As I've said repeatedly acting like an occupying force is bound to end up in creating these situations. Seriously, two idiots were walking down the middle of the street. The best way to deal with two young, macho guys is not to get all chest and shoulders yourself just because you have a badge.

He could not have been an arrogant asshole cop and pulled up and starting yelling at these guys.

Apparently you haven't heard that that story was a lie.

There are dispatch tapes of Wilson asking if the other cops need help looking for the robbery suspects, then of him calling for backup before the (second) encounter with Brown and Johnson. There's no doubt at all that at that point Wilson was after them because of the store robbery and not because they were walking in the street.

There are dispatch tapes of Wilson asking if the other cops need help looking for the robbery suspects, then of him calling for backup before the (second) encounter with Brown and Johnson. There's no doubt at all that at that point Wilson was after them because of the store robbery and not because they were walking in the street.

You Lawyer's are tiresome.

Don't you know that incontrovertible forensic evidence should never get in the way of a good narrative.

There's a war on black males, and that's the way it is. A winning slogan is a winning slogan.

Come up with great slogans Turk, like "Hand Up, Don't Shoot", or "No Justice, No Peace", and then people will listen.

There are dispatch tapes of Wilson asking if the other cops need help looking for the robbery suspects, then of him calling for backup before the (second) encounter with Brown and Johnson. There's no doubt at all that at that point Wilson was after them because of the store robbery and not because they were walking in the street.

Is his initial interaction with them also disproven? Or did Brown just decide to charge a cop at random?

You want to know what Wilson could have done? He could not have been an arrogant asshole cop and pulled up and starting yelling at these guys. As I've said repeatedly acting like an occupying force is bound to end up in creating these situations. Seriously, two idiots were walking down the middle of the street. The best way to deal with two young, macho guys is not to get all chest and shoulders yourself just because you have a badge.

Community policing.

Take the race element out of it and go back to the Utah case. The cop zoomed up, jumped out of their cars with guns drawn, and ended up shooting the guy a few seconds later because he made a strange and "threatening" motion after being screamed at by two armed men. The police chose to engage in the most direct and aggressive way they could, and it resulted in someone getting shot completely unnecessarily.

It's not at all hard to believe that Wilson escalated the situation. Assuming Brown grabbed at his gun, that meant the gun was out before Brown had gone anything threatening. If we buy the official sequence of events, Brown did himself in with his choices of actions, but Wilson set up the whole scenario. Pulling right up to them, getting his gun out, are both actions that escalated the situation.

If a police officer is so worried about two large men that you feel like you may have to shoot them in short order if they do anything aggressive, how about you sit back and observe and wait for assistance? Brown had assaulted someone, sure, but he wasn't a killer or anything so pressing that his immediate arrest was a matter of public safety. The whole thing could easily have played out without anyone getting hurt if it had been set up differently from the beginning. Same deal with the Utah situation.

The point here isn't Monday morning QBing, but examining the broader approach to policing and the attitudes of the police towards their community.

I tend to agree that the Utah shooting as well as the Tamir Rice shootings were examples of "too quick on the draw".

I do not think the Michael Brown case is an example of this. I do not disagree that with a certain amount of "what ifs" Brown's shooting could have been avoided. But I find no fault with Wilson, morally or legally.

AAMOF, I feel much worse for Trayvon's parents than for Browns.

Obviously, not all shootings of unarmed black men by the police are valid. But the majority certainly are. If someone doesn't believe that they should be joining up with Al and the usual suspects. I find in absurd and extremely counter productive to say that there is a "war on black males" by the police.

Is his initial interaction with them also disproven? Or did Brown just decide to charge a cop at random?

There's no question at all that they were walking in the middle of the road or that Wilson told them to move. Did Wilson curse at them--we only have Dorian Johnson's word for that. He's a proven liar. Why would you think his story is probable, anyway? Did someone curse at Brown to make him steal the cigars? Did someone curse at him to make him brazenly walk down the middle of the road not even trying to hide the loot? I don't see how you can believe that Wilson provoked Brown when nobody had to provoke him to do the various other crazy things he did that morning.

"Too quick on the draw?" That cop was patrolling the staircase with his gun out. That was not case of on man getting into a shouting match/resisting/in the middle of committing a crime. He was washing down the staircase and was shot dead by an inexperienced/afraid officer who never should have been given a shield in the first place.

There is a way to do this. "Police. Coming up/down. NYPD. Coming up/down the stairs."
There is a way to not do this: Have your weapon out in 1 hand and flashlight in another when there is no threat.

I do not think the Michael Brown case is an example of this. I do not disagree that with a certain amount of "what ifs" Brown's shooting could have been avoided. But I find no fault with Wilson, morally or legally.

I'm not trying to say that Wilson should be in jail. I think it's an interesting scenario for looking at the broader phenomena of police shootings and the modern style of policing (especially in poor and/or minority communities).

Quote:

Obviously, not all shootings of unarmed black men by the police are valid. But the majority certainly are. If someone doesn't believe that they should be joining up with Al and the usual suspects. I find in absurd and extremely counter productive to say that there is a "war on black males" by the police.

How would we even know what ratio of shootings are valid? The incidents aren't even reported to the national level. Even there, "majority" is a terribly low standard. Most First World countries have a bare handful of police shootings (justified or unjustified) a year, we have hundreds of known unjustified shootings.

As far as "war," we do have a self-proclaimed war on drugs. They're not actually fighting "drugs," they're fighting people who use and sell drugs. I don't think it's too much of a stretch for some communities to feel like they're battling the police. If you'd been Stop and Frisked in NYC just for being black in a black neighborhood (even a high crime neighborhood), I doubt you'd have much confidence that the police were really on your side.

To address Gib's point on the war on drugs, I support a huge fence, perhaps 80 feet high, a moat with alligators, snipers, and attack drones from 30 miles off the southern most California coast all the way into the Gulf of Mexico 30 miles thence.

I tend to agree that the Utah shooting as well as the Tamir Rice shootings were examples of "too quick on the draw".

I do not think the Michael Brown case is an example of this. I do not disagree that with a certain amount of "what ifs" Brown's shooting could have been avoided. But I find no fault with Wilson, morally or legally.

AAMOF, I feel much worse for Trayvon's parents than for Browns.

Obviously, not all shootings of unarmed black men by the police are valid. But the majority certainly are. If someone doesn't believe that they should be joining up with Al and the usual suspects. I find in absurd and extremely counter productive to say that there is a "war on black males" by the police.